


The Time Traveller’s Guide: Important Additional Information

by lost_spook



Category: The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England - Ian Mortimer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-20
Updated: 2013-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-05 07:46:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1091380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/pseuds/lost_spook
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because there are always some people who seem to need the obvious spelling out to them…</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Time Traveller’s Guide: Important Additional Information

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kaesa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaesa/gifts).



> This is a (rather flippant) treat written on reading your letter (because it immediately occurred to me that the kind of organisation that arranged tour guides into the past must surely be the more respectable sibling organisation to the one that arranges tour guides into Fantasyland. This moved a little away from that starting point, but the debt stands). Also, I’m terribly sorry, but I had to mention paradoxes. Your Dear Writer would never have been so cavalier, I’m sure, but I hope you enjoy this frippery piece anyway. Happy Yuletide!

On publishing the original Time Travellers’ Guides, we believed we had covered the pertinent aspects for the responsible time travelling tourist. However, to our regret, the following additional section has now become necessary – largely due to the fact that a small but significant number of said tourists have turned out to be anything but responsible.

* * *

I(i) Once the target period for your Tour has been selected, Tourists may on no account exit the timeline before or after said point. The number of people seemingly incapable of grasping this simple concept defies belief. Yes, it will make a difference. Your Time Traveller’s Guide to the Fourteenth Century will not cut much ice in the early Neolithic, or even the Seventeenth Century. 

More pertinently, unauthorised exit points are – unlike your convenient, safe and carefully planned Tour exits – far more likely to open up in the middle of battles, dangerous locations, off-shore, or in someone’s great hall/cottage/private chamber. We refuse to accept responsibility for Tourists who are drowned, kicked out of doors, or hacked to death as a result of their own carelessness and/or deliberate error.

(ii) Any examples of time travelling experiments noted in the Time Traveller’s Guide introductory notes were intended to be purely theoretical. Tourists must not under any circumstances test out such ideas in practice. You may feel that removing an Eighteenth Century Prime Minister to see whether or not he can liven up late Twentieth Century election campaigns (or indeed, even grasp such concepts as a “secret ballot” and “universal suffrage”) is an experiment worth trying, but such people are SIGNIFICANT FIGURES and not to be meddled with. Removing them from their timeline can cause destruction of that timeline itself, leaving you with no home to go to, or, in some cases, you may find you no longer exist and – much as we may feel you deserve your fate – this will generally cause a PARADOX. Your mistake will be corrected by your non-existence, repeated by your reinstated self and on into infinity (but for the intervention of our already over-worked TIME AGENTS). 

Therefore, regardless of your feelings that William Pitt the Younger as leader of the Conservative Party might improve the 1980s, or that a 21st Century Lib-Con coalition would be more interesting if headed by Benjamin Disraeli and W E Gladstone, you are required to be nothing more than an observer on your forays back in time. (No one will need reminding of the disaster and near complete destruction of the vortex and the planet itself that followed the attempt to bring Elizabeth I, Henry V, Lloyd George and Winston Churchill together in the 22nd Century.) 

Also, we should here stress that it has already been conclusively proven that Norman knights are indeed surprisingly effective at defeating their Fourteenth Century counterparts (largely due to complete ignorance of the rules of jousting, including the concept of it as a sport). You needn’t trouble yourself to run the risk of repeating the experiment. 

As for the individual who was hospitalised in an attempt to discover what would happen if the Duke of Wellington was removed from the Battle of Waterloo, our sympathies are with the Duke and we will not take responsibility for this or for any other such incident. No compensation will be forthcoming. 

 

II. No anachronistic articles are to be taken back into the past. We cannot emphasise the importance of this simple rule too much or too often. If you should misguidedly smuggle one such item past our detectors and guards at the Vortex Hubs then, at the very least, we expect you to tidy up after yourself and do not under any circumstances leave such objects lying about in previous centuries. You may think dropping your watch in the Thirteenth Century will make little difference to anyone but yourself. Archaeologists, however, disagree. Often violently and at length.

The numbers of inexplicably ancient Coke cans, electronic devices, mobile phones and various toiletries (toothpaste tubes, deodorant etc. etc.) that have been uncovered by archaeologists is becoming embarrassing and our TIME AGENTS cannot be expected to retrieve them all.* Please leave all your belongings in the locker provided for you at the Vortex Hub. Whatever your feelings may be concerning boredom, personal hygiene, or dietary requirements, they are far outweighed by the importance of leaving the timeline undamaged.

*For evidence of the problem, certain unfortunate episodes of the television series “Time Team” can be made available to you on request.

 

III. (i) Please refrain from any attempts to create a Grandfather Paradox (becoming your own grandparent, we mean, not killing any ancestors you may happen across. We trust that actually does go without saying). Even if it is “for science”. In general, please abstain from any sexual relationships with any natives of any time periods not your own. While some encounters may produce very little alteration to the timeline, the risk is still unjustifiable. 

Please, do not be misled by mistaken and sensationalist material suggesting that we are all, in fact, our own ancestors and will cease to exist unless we ensure our eventual births by sex with distant ancestors. We are absolutely certain this is incorrect and it will not be accepted as an excuse if you are caught out by our TOUR GUIDES or TIME AGENTS.

 

(ii) Yes, this rule does apply to everyone. We particularly do not wish to repeat the unfortunate events of early tours – “pulling” as many medieval queens as possible is not the aim of any of our Tours. Furthermore, we will not always be around to save you from the inevitable consequences and your stay in the Tower of London may become permanent.

 

IV. Miscellaneous:

(i). Will the Tourist who removed Roger Bacon please return him to his proper place and time? Thank you.

(ii) The section on coins (p.95) in the Medieval Guide is in no way intended as a handy money-making tip. Furthermore, all reputable establishments have now been instructed to hand any over suspiciously new gold florins and the year 1344 has now been made out of bounds for Tourists in Historical Britain. We regret that certain individuals have made this a necessity.

(iii) The Historical Tour Company _cannot_ be held liable for any travel inconveniences, lack of basic health care, or five star accommodation in your chosen century. What you are to expect is clearly outlined in the relevant Time Traveller’s Guide. If you do not wish to deal with (for example) the unpleasant reality of a Fourteenth Century sea voyage, please select our 1930s Ocean Liner option instead.* In addition, all TOUR GUIDES in the field are equipped with medical kits and first aid training. You should always apply to them first before approaching any local physicians to avoid accidental death by antiquated health care. 

A further note: all time travellers are fully decontaminated before and after entering the Vortex Hubs. Known plague hotspots like 1665 and 1348-50 are already banned years, but – despite certain alarmist media reports – there is no danger of reviving long-forgotten illnesses. Rest assured that the Historical Tour Guide Company takes the issue of avoidance of pandemics that could potentially decimate the contemporary population of the world with the seriousness it deserves.

* As a popular destination, there may be a waiting list. (NB. This option is not to be confused with that provided by the Crime Tours organisation.)

Abide by these few, simple rules and you will find your forays into the living past instructive and rewarding, reasonably priced, and significantly less likely to kill you. Thank you for your co-operation.

* * *

Explanatory Notes:

PARADOX:  
What happens, will happen, already happened, and never happened when Tourists fail to obey the very simple rules outlined in these guidelines and your Time Traveller’s Guide for the period.

 

SIGNIFICANT FIGURES:   
Removing or harming _anyone_ from the past is utterly forbidden, as even the smallest alteration can have catastrophic results. However, while some instances can be easily fixed or absorbed, the removal of Significant Figures is liable to bring about more trouble than most. Tourists who have tried such tactics (the “rescuing” of Richard III from Bosworth is a popular instance*) soon discover that either they have no future to return to, that they do not exist and/or the people they were trying to impress no longer exist/know them, or that there is inexplicably no longer any Cadbury’s Chocolate. 

Also, on the related matter of Shakespeare: yes, it has been done before. Whatever it was you were thinking. One more misguided attempt to take him to visit the reconstructed late Twentieth Century Globe Theatre will probably cause the whole timeline to collapse into instability around that point. This may have conclusively proved that the Swan was a lot less like the original than everybody had hoped, but it nevertheless has to stop. We have a plaintive sonnet from the Bard himself requesting our Tourists to cease their attentions. Any further interference and late Sixteenth Century/early Seventeenth Century London will be allocated as an off-limits time period, which would be a sad loss.

(Please also see our remarks in the text above concerning attempts to take our own Guides’ introductory speculations too literally – re. exchange of PMs fiasco.)

*Please note: regardless of guilt or innocence in matters of regicide, we can inform you from experience that most if not all medieval monarchs do not make ideal houseguests.

 

TIME AGENTS:   
The unfortunate people who have to clean up after Tourists. If you accidentally kill your own grandfather, step on the wrong butterfly or drop sweet wrappers at the Battle of Hastings, these are the people who will do their best to restore the timeline to its original pristine state. Try such things too many times and next time you cease to exist, they may just leave you that way.

 

TIMELINE:  
A term used here for the sake of simplicity – everyone knows time is actually much more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff.

 

TOUR GUIDES  
Our experts in the period who will navigate you through your historical travels. They are all fully equipped with medical supplies, trained in first aid, and experienced in using the Vortex Hubs and navigating the pitfalls of your chosen period. Please apply any queries in the field to them. Adherence to this rule can save your life.


End file.
